Fall to You (Here and Now 2)

I’ve been going to church all my life. I’ve never been good about saying my prayers, but in this moment, there’s nothing else I can do but pray. I draw my knees to my chest and lean my head against them. William and Cally would make great parents. They have an amazing relationship, and I know how much a baby would mean to them. Cally told me that William can’t have kids because of some football accident when he was in high school, but I know they want babies badly. Why doesn’t God give them an unexpected pregnancy? Why me?

I lift my head and stare at the stick. I should stand and look. One line or two. That simple.

But it’s not simple at all. Two lines means not knowing whose baby I’m carrying in my belly. Two lines means having to figure out whose baby this is, and one possibility is more complicated than the next.

What if it’s Nate’s? Nate, the amazing man who doesn’t want to have a family of his own because he doesn’t want his son to feel second best. If it’s his, I can’t tell him. Because he’ll believe he has to break the promise he made to himself and his son. And he’d resent me forever.

And what if it’s Max’s? Max, who wants me for all the wrong reasons but still holds my heart. Should I cancel a wedding to a man I love if I’m carrying his baby?

Two lines means telling my mother that I’m going to have a baby out of wedlock. It means disappointing her. Two lines means the end of this charade and the beginning of something terrifying and unknown.

My knees are wet with my tears when Liz knocks on the stall door. I reach up to unlock it for her, and she frowns when she sees me curled up on the floor.

“What did it say?”

“I’m supposed to be a virgin,” I whisper as if that answers her question.

I don’t have to say anything else before she’s picking up the stick.

Emotions flash over her face in quick succession. Disappointment, sadness, frustration, and finally happiness.

“So?”

A tear trickles down her cheek. “I can’t bring myself to be disappointed about having a niece or nephew.”

A sob tears from my chest, and then my whole body is shaking as she sinks to the floor and wraps me in her arms.

“Shh,” she whispers. “We’re going to figure this out. Shh.”

When Liz drops me off at my apartment, I find Max sitting in the dark, elbows on his knees, head cradled in his hands. “How long have you been seeing him?” he whispers. “Did it start after you broke up with me or before?”

“What?” I flip on a light and drop my keys and purse on the island. I wish he’d told me he was coming over. I wasn’t prepared for this tonight. It hurts to look at him, to have him so close when everything about the last twenty-four hours has turned my world upside down.

He lifts his head and tosses a magazine onto the coffee table. “Nate Crane? The fucking rocker?” He releases a humorless chuckle. “And here I am, this fool who thought he had a chance to win you back. I thought all I had to do was prove my love, but there was someone else all this time.”

My heart doubles its pace and every beat aches like someone pounding on a bruise. “I didn’t meet Nate until after you and I broke up.” I realize I sound defensive, and shake my head. “I don’t owe you an apology. For the last month, I’ve been walking around sick with guilt because I thought I’d betrayed you. But I didn’t cheat on you. We were broken up. And worse than that? We were broken up because you never wanted me to begin with.”

“Never wanted you? You’re fucking kidding me, right? I want you, Hanna. I want you so badly I’m consumed with it. I want you and no one but you.”

“I know you believe that.”

His jaw hardens and he drags a hand through his hair, making a mess of it. “Let me fill you in on some of the pieces you might have forgotten. Three months, I waited for you. I wanted to marry you or, at the very least, have you give us another chance. Three months, Hanna. And I would have waited even longer if that’s what it took. But to know that while I was waiting—while my ring was in your jewelry box—you were playing house with some asshole rocker, a guy I could never compete with.”

“Compete?” I laugh, but it sounds ugly. Sick. “You never would have had to compete with him if you’d just wanted me from the start. You were the only thing I ever wanted, Max, but you ruined it when you hurt me.”

I stomp across the room and snatch the magazine from the coffee table, but the indignation drains out of me when I see the two pictures on the cover. In the first, I’m in a wedding dress on Asher’s balcony, right next to Nate. It’s not terribly incriminating as far as pictures go—and the headline about Nate’s secret marriage is just ridiculous. But combined with the picture next to it—me straddling Nate in his hot tub, my arms wrapped around his neck…

“That’s what your mom was looki

ng at when she got her chest pains. She was getting her hair done at Meredith’s salon and picked up that magazine to see her daughter on the front.” He moves to the picture window and looks out into the black night. I wait for him to turn, wait for him to look at me. He doesn’t. “Apparently she was a little shocked to discover you’d been hooking up with Nate Crane.” His voice drops. “She’s not the only one.”

I only speak when I can’t stand the silence anymore. “Didn’t you know?” I whisper.

“I suspected there was someone. You said there wasn’t.”

I wince. I lied to Max?

“Are you in love with him?”